The Blog

Silent but Still Deadly

Inhis final column, AJ Stoughton questioned the cultural supremacy of free speech in America. In his argument one is reminded of the fact that America is usually considered the nation with the strongest tradition of free speech and some of the most substantial protections for it. Perhaps, like most questions, this should always be up for debate.

However, particularly relevant to me as a Muslim was when AJ referenced Marco Rubio comparing radical Islam to Nazism. Evidently he thinks Rubio should not be free to say that. He seems to suggest that limiting or banning incendiary or controversial speech is the key factor in dealing with actual hatred, intolerance, and violence in society.

If we look to Europe, we see that this past week the Front Nationale, a deeply reactionary party with roots in French neo-nazism, won a plurality in the French regional elections. In my view, this is not the result of not enough censorship, but of too much. Laws concerning freedom of speech are much more restricted there than they are here in the United States, especially with respect to minority communities. When you make it illegal to scapegoat, that does not change minds and it it does not deal with prejudice. This is not an abstract question. When governments can direct the courts towards banning hate and scapegoating, it merely emboldens those who wield hate and ties the fate of marginalized groups to a discredited political system.

The best way to deal with hate isto fight it, to disprove it, and to put something in its place. Much of the nation is on edge after two far right wing f**k-wits with the audacity to call themselves “Muslims” attacked a municipal government event. They are very much the Muslim Dylann Roof so I don’t for a moment judge the people who have genuine fear about terrorism. Some of these people will go to Trump or someone else who partakes in hate because they are asking a question, “what do we do about this problem?” and not getting an answer from anyone else. The answer may not be guns and bombs but it has to be something- there has to be acounter narrative that addressesour role in the problem, that ofthe right wing in the Muslim world, andthat of terrorism itself, and a plan to deal with the problem in both the short and long term. This only comes from real conversations that we must have.

Hate and paranoia scare me much more than hate speech or paranoid language and sacrificing our sacred cow of free speech will not deal with the real problems we face, it merely bats away the discursive effects of these issues until they explode.